


And I Will Not Go Gentle

by morganoconner



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Brothers, Family Feels, Gen, Post-Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-20
Updated: 2019-02-20
Packaged: 2019-10-31 21:27:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17857232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morganoconner/pseuds/morganoconner
Summary: Klaus finally asks the question Ben has been waiting a long time for.





	And I Will Not Go Gentle

**Author's Note:**

> HAHAHA I just watched this entire show in two days and I haven't done the fic writing thing in approximately 6000 years and then this happened in about thirty minutes so WHOOPS. I just. I have a lot of feels about all my new disaster kids, but especially about these two disaster kids. *sniff*

Ben has been waiting for the question for a long time, but it isn't until much later – when they're back in their own time, when the apocalypse is a memory instead of a reality, when their family is finally starting to heal in more ways than one – that Klaus finally asks. He's been sober for over a year now, the shakes long gone from his hands and the clarity steadier in his eyes, but he's still Klaus, and he fidgets for a long time, eyes darting to Ben and away again, before he manages to frame the question the way he wants to.

In the end, it comes out in a rush, on a heavy exhale: "How come you never moved on?"

Over the long years since his death, Ben has thought of a lot of ways he might answer this question when it was finally asked, but he forgets all of them in the moment. Anyway, the only thing that matters is the truth: "You needed me, dumbass." He sees the words hit, sees the flinch that means Klaus has taken them exactly the wrong way, and rushes to clarify. "You didn't hold me back, or anything. I just mean…look, Klaus, we all had damage. Dad was…"

Klaus snorts, then sniffs. "Yeah. Dad _was_."

"Right." Ben nods, sitting on the couch beside his brother, wishing he could feel the warmth of his skin, wishing he could feel anything at all, really. "But everybody else…Luther had Dad and missions, Diego had…well, his idea of missions. Allison had her family. Even Vanya had her own kind of happiness. You didn't feel like you had anything except drugs. You weren't happy…you never even had moments of it, like Vanya did."

"So you haunted me to make me happy?" Klaus is giving him serious side-eye.

"No, I haunted you because I cared, and I just…" Ben pauses, then offers a half-shrug. "I wanted you to know that somebody did." He quirks a small smile in his brother's direction. "You remember telling Cha-Cha and Hazel that no one would notice you'd disappeared? I would have. Even if I were alive, I mean…I'd have noticed, Klaus."

Klaus is openly staring at him now, and then his hands glow and before Ben can adjust to the sudden sensations of _air_ and _weight_ and _touch_ that come with Klaus' power, he's being tackled in a hug that knocks the unnecessary breath from his lungs. His arms come up and he's hugging back even before his brain has fully caught up, and it's awkward and uncomfortable because of the angle, but that's okay.

"I'm…I'm…" Klaus' words get muffled by the way his face is pressed into Ben's shoulders and the sobs wracking his body.

"It's okay," Ben murmurs, rubbing his back and holding on a little tighter while he still can. "You’re my brother, Klaus. And I love you. And I'm not going anywhere as long as I still have a choice about it."

Klaus tries to say something else, maybe _thank you_ or maybe _you're stupid_ or maybe _I'm sorry I made your ghost shoulder so snotty_ but it doesn't really matter what the words are, they all mean the same thing in Klaus-speak, which Ben has become quite fluent in after years of being everything from his shadow to his conscience.

 _I love you too_.


End file.
